


New Tenant

by ThePostalDude



Category: Sally Face (Video Games)
Genre: AU, Angst, Friend Fluff, Other, oops as it turns out i am angsting it up in chapter 1 okay here we go, probably later
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-10-14
Updated: 2018-10-14
Packaged: 2019-08-01 22:51:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,655
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16293365
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ThePostalDude/pseuds/ThePostalDude
Summary: New kid on the block Larry Johnson moves into the Addison Apartments. Kind of a nice place with nice people, but nothing special. That is, until he realizes he's being watched.





	New Tenant

To a lot of kids, moving felt like the end of the world. It meant leaving your friends behind, your old house, the place you were used to. While it didn't seem like much of a problem to adults, it could be almost crushing to a kid. And to Larry, he was entering a whole new town where he would have to get used to it all over again. Not to mention having to put all of his stuff in boxes and help carry them on and off a truck. He felt absolutely  _ miserable _ . They weren't even moving into a house; it was an apartment complex. To him, this was even worse, but his mother did her best to keep his hopes up during the ride to their new home. 

 

"Don't be so down in the dumps, Lar-bear! I've seen a handful of kids in the apartment already, I'm sure they'll love to have a new friend like you to play with!" She was driving while his dad was passed out in the passenger seat. He'd been packing the last of their stuff up for the entirety of last night and was finally down for the count.

Larry had been staring out the window with his head against the glass before looking up, crinkling his nose. "Mom, don't call me that! I don't _'_ _ play _ _'_ , I hang out. Besides, you make it sound like there's...  _ kids  _ kids, not people my age." Although, thinking about it, maybe there would be babysitting opportunities in that. He would do any small job around their old block for quick cash.

 

They were just starting to enter the town now. It was still so early in the morning, but they had a long drive to get from their old home to here. It was the earliest Larry had ever had gotten up for.

"Well, when me and your father were talking to Mr. Addison the other day, he mentioned there  _ were _ a few high schoolers your age. So I'm sure you'll have plenty of opportunities to ' _ hang out! _ ” His mom laughed. She was always looking to the brighter side of things.

 

The apartments themselves were both... different and similar at the same time to the pictures Larry's parents had shown him. It was bigger in person than in the photos, but looked just as grey and boring. He wanted to just go back to sleep after the exhausting drive, but they still had more work to do-- unpacking, unpacking, and unpacking. He was stressed out enough about moving as it was. Getting a key from Mr. Addison was no problem (it perplexed Larry that he spoke through his mail slot rather than face-to-face-- but he had to respect a guy who loved not interacting with other people). They were moving all of their stuff up to apartment 404. It seemed cool to have a room on such a high floor, but Larry's mind went right back to the thought of carrying all of his stuff up. It was time for the hardest part of moving.

They didn't have that many boxes to move, but out of the three of them, Larry had the most things to carry up. He was a bit more materialistic than his parents, especially keeping in mind that he didn't want to throw any of his old paintings away. After helping each other move in beds, they put up their personal things by themselves. However, his parents had gotten done way before him and were finally resting again. Larry still had just a few more boxes.

It was when Larry had gone down in the elevator and walked back with a box did he feel it. Someone watching him. A quick look around of the place earlier revealed there were no cameras installed, and there was no one else around. It was at this moment he realized, besides his parents and Mr. Addison, he hadn’t seen a soul. The teen hugged the box of dismantled easel parts closer to his stomach, watching the numbers go up on the screen above him. He didn’t feel it before, but there was just an almost paranoid feeling of being watched. Was it just from moving into a new place? Before he could dwell more on it, the elevator finally stopping moving and dinged, opening the doors. Larry swallowed and stepped out back onto the 4th floor, sighing.

“I can’t let this place get to me so easily. It’ll be cool-- nothing’s different. Just a… different house, with different people. It’s cool.” Yeah, giving himself a pep talk would work. No one else would be there to see him talking to himself anyway. It didn’t help with the oppressive feeling at all though. If anything, the feeling got worse now that he got back on his floor. He was almost paralyzed.

No, he  _ was _ paralyzed. The moment he stepped out of the elevator he couldn’t budge an inch-- an immense fear had swept over him.

Larry looked around with his eyes, willing his head to move. “...M-Mom? Dad?” Larry slowly moved his head to the left, down to where his apartment was. His voice almost came out as a squeak; barely enough to carry to them. Feeling the knot in his stomach get worse by the minute, Larry looked to the other side. Feeling if he just sucked it up and looked around, he would see there’s nothing wrong--

The apartment door he looked at slammed closed. As if a connection had been cut off, Larry promptly dropped the whole box he was carrying as he lost the feeling in his arms, just causing even more noise to rang out in the empty hall. Luckily, he no longer felt paralyzed, but his body  _ did _ feel like jelly. After that, it was silence. The whole oppressive feeling was gone. That door was slightly ajar just a second ago. Apartment 402. God, he just wanted to get out of here. Larry was ready to flop over and crawl to his room if he had to, until someone else interrupted him.

 

He hadn’t heard another door open at all, or the person approaching him, but now a woman stood before him just outside of 403. Green hair and a long pink dress.

“Oh, you must be one of the new tenants! I came out here to see what all the noise was so early in the morning. The noise scared me half to death!”

Larry looked down and realized she was wearing blue fuzzy slippers, a fact meaning it was still super early in the morning. He hoped this wouldn’t leave a bad impression.

 

“Sorry, I… dropped my box. I’m still trying to get everything moved in, but my arms were getting sore. I’ve been at it all morning.” That wasn’t much of a lie, really. He felt exhausted. The woman’s eyes widened just a bit.

“All morning? Oh dear, I didn’t even introduce myself! You can call me Mrs. Sanderson, sweety. Don’t you think you should take a little break? I just put coffee on-- you could tell me more about yourself if you want to join me.” That didn’t seem like too bad an offer, and coffee probably would help him in his final push to get everything out of the car.

 

Larry entered and looked around before deciding to drop his box right next to the door. Mrs. Sanderson’s apartment was small (the same as theirs), but was pretty homely, lived-in. She mentioned her husband being away on business being part of the reason it felt so sparse and quiet though. What really drew Larry’s attention was a set of Glitter Ponies. He never liked the show himself, but one can’t just look away from the bright things. Mrs. Sanderson came back from the kitchen and sat next to the couch-side table that held the toys, setting down a cup of coffee on it and handing Larry one.

“So, tell me about yourself. I didn’t even catch your name! Your family’s the Johnson's though, correct? Mr. Addison had a meeting and told us we had new neighbors on the way.”

Larry had already been making himself right at home, rubbing his cold hands snugly around the hot mug. “Yeah, my name’s Larry Johnson. I like to paint, play video games, listen to metal and… that’s kind of all I do. My dad thought us moving into a smaller town would be a good way to get away from the bigger city and ‘have a closer community’ as he put it.” The teen sipped the coffee thoughtfully-- Mrs. Sanderson had put sweet creamer in it just for him.

 

“Oh, me and Herman used to be in the city many years ago! We came here after finding out he had a better paying job opportunity here, as he put it. It’s a small town, but you’d be surprised. I mostly keep to myself here though while he’s out on business.” Larry felt right off the bat she was a sweet lady, which put his mind at ease. The whole scene with the door earlier was still sticking out in his mind.

 

After pleasantries were aside and Larry tried to think of more things to talk about, his mind came back to the apartment from earlier.

“Mrs. Sanderson… since you’ve been around a lot longer, do you happen to know the person who lives in the apartment next to the elevator? 402? It might’ve just been them checking to see who was moving in, but I thought they were… watching me.”

He expected to see just another reassuring smile. What he didn’t expect was the sad shadow that came over her face.

“Oh, Larry… I wouldn’t go around peaking in that room. No one’s lived there for a year now. I hope you’re not going to be snooping around and slamming doors like I heard earlier?”

 

Larry’s face got a little red, a little embarrassed for bringing it up in the first place. “No, Mrs. Sanderson, nothing like that. Maybe it was just my imagination. Can you tell me who lived in it before?”

When the woman’s face got another sad look, he realized he was asking all the wrong questions.

“Just a boy and his father. A boy about your age actually, I think. But we don’t go talking about Sal here dear… it’s just not right with what happened.”

 

Well now he was even more curious, despite how sad she seemed to get. The teen wanted to press for answers, just a bit more. “Can’t you tell me what happened at all? I’ll be living here ‘til further notice, so… maybe I should know, you know? To keep me from snoopin’ and slammin’ doors?” The teen bobbed his eyebrows when he said the last part, getting a small laugh from the woman and bringing a bit more shine back to her face.

“Well, alright… I guess you should know just a bit, to keep you from slammin’ those doors, but I don’t want to go giving you nightmares.” Mrs. Sanderson took a longer sip from her coffee as she stared at the news on tv, trying to gather her words.

 

“About a year ago, a man and his son had moved into 402. Henry and Sal Fisher respectively. Henry was kind of a quiet man who kept to himself, but was pleasant enough to talk to. Sal…” she sighed as she thought back to some memory Larry didn’t know. “If you met Sal, you would be put off at first. He wore a mask.”

Larry took the mug from his lips, a bit confused. “A mask? Like, a monster mask?”

“Well, no.” Mrs. Sanderson clinked her nail against the mug as she thought back. “I was told it was a prosthetic. The poor boy got in an accident when he was fairly young, and that same accident took his mother. From what I know, him and his father moved here to get away from those bad memories. He never took it off.” She looked down in her mug, a slight tremble in her voice.

“But let me tell you, he was the kindest boy I have ever met. He had a rough life, yet helped anyone he could and looked forward to every day. He was brave too. He liked to be called ‘Sally Face’, and he told me it was because when people tried to use the name against him, he simply took it and wore it proudly. Once you’ve met him, you’d never want to think badly of the world again. He was just that kind.” A tear started to well up in her eyes and she turned away for a moment to rub it away.

“He managed to become friends with everybody in the building soon enough, and everyone at his school. It just made losing him that much harder though…”

 

Now Larry actually started to feel bad for prying. He didn’t know what to say at this point, still drinking the coffee to keep his mouth occupied. Mrs. Sanderson kept going, though.

“It was around the beginning of last winter when it happened. I’m guessing when you get in an accident as severe as Sally’s at a young age, it comes with… health complications. His immune system wasn’t the best. He was always catching colds and staying home from school, busying himself by snooping around the halls instead of staying in bed like he should, and the stress from still adjusting to a new place was probably adding to it. He just… got very sick one day. Very,  _ very _ sick. And before we knew it, he was gone.”

 

A small moment of silence, Mrs. Sanderson recollecting herself a bit, and Larry absorbing this information. Now he really just felt like a dick. Mrs. Sanderson kept speaking. At this point, he just wanted the interaction to end on a light note.

“Henry moved out right before spring. I guess he really liked running from his problems. But he left some of his stuff behind… mostly Sally’s. Mr. Addison keeps saying he’s going to get that room cleared out to rent it to future tenants, but everybody knows he’s lying. It serves to hold Sal’s memory now.”

Now it was time for Larry to say something. He had caused enough of a ruckus this whole morning already. “I’m sorry for prying… I’m sure he’s in a… cooler place now, y’know?”

Mrs. Anderson nodded before setting her coffee aside. Larry had already finished his from getting so sucked up in her story.

“It’s quite alright Larry dear. I’m sure you would have heard it sooner or later if you lived around the apartment long enough.” While this was a nice (but a bit melancholic) exchange, he felt he had overstayed just a bit.

“Thanks for the coffee Mrs. Anderson. I’m gonna get going… I’ll see you around?”

Mrs. Anderson gave him a small wave and took his mug. “Yes, I’ll see you around. You can always come by and talk, okay? I get lonely over here sometimes.”

 

Now Larry had packed up his box again and left, going back to his original destination. Not before stopping to give one last look at 402, though. Looking back at 403 before balancing his box in one arm, he checked the doorknob. Locked.

It probably would have been best if it  _ was _ some creep looking at him. Now it was mid-day and he was lying in his bed, procrastinating from putting sheets on it. He hadn’t been able to nap ever since he got back. He kept thinking to the split second the door was open and staring into it’s darkness, a fraction of a moment of seeing a small figure in the doorway and holding onto the knob. The oppressive feeling. The long length of blue hair hiding their face. And then the door being slammed closed. 

 

He couldn’t sleep that night either.

**Author's Note:**

> "...M-Mom? Dad?" If you can't relate to this scene, then you've never been stared at by a ghost and don't know about the childlike fear you can revert to, so don't look at my face! It's 4:55 AM shit boy I die boy.
> 
> This is for you Cal love ya bitch even though you test me sometimes, like God.


End file.
